The ancient Greeks called it
arrogant pride or presumption. Seldom has a freshly sworn-in prime minister
displayed hubris so abundantly, so rapidly, and on such a slim electoral basis
as the new Canadian P.M. Stephen Harper.

Within days of the January 23
federal election, in which a mere 7 per cent shift in the popular vote tilted
the Parliamentary seating plan from a Liberal minority government to a
Conservative minority, Harper swiftly violated two of his vaunted principles,
and created one big furor in the process.

Harper enticed David Emerson,
who was re-elected as a Liberal in British Columbia’s Vancouver Kingsway
riding, to cross over to the Tories in exchange for a Cabinet portfolio
(International Trade, the same one he held in the Paul Martin Cabinet). Never
mind that Harper criticized then-Tory Belinda Stronach
for jumping to the Liberals eight months earlier. And after campaigning for a
political lifetime in favour of an elected Senate,
Harper appointed non-elected Montreal
businessman Michael Fortier to his new Cabinet via the Senate. That
these acts of hypocrisy did not sit well with Tory MPs (two complained
publicly), let alone with most of rest of the country, should have come as no
surprise to the former head of the right wing National Citizen’s
Coalition.

Nonetheless, faster than a
born-again Richard Nixon, Harper revealed his thin skin and strong disdain for
media criticism by rudely waving off reporters and then by firing his
communications chief (who held the post for less than two weeks — was
this another record?).

Meanwhile, residents of
Vancouver Kingsway held rallies and collected thousands of signatures demanding
that Emerson resign and run in a by-election as a Conservative. The labour-based New Democratic Party jumped on the turncoat issue
and filed a “conflict of interest” complaint with Parliament’s
ethics commissioner.

Regardless what happens to
Emerson and Fortier, Harper’s faux pas is a perversely welcome
development for several reasons. It exposes the emptiness of his populist
rhetoric, and immediately takes the gloss off the new regime. It dulls Harper’s
blade for the next assault. It underscores the lack of mandate for radical
rightist policies (during the two month federal campaign Harper kept his “social
conservative” candidates under wraps, and he talked like a clean
government moderate). And it may even shorten the life of his minority
government.

Harper scrambled to put this
controversy behind him by appointing a Paul Martin Liberal nominee to the
Supreme Court, and by trying to heal the rift in
conservative ranks by designating Michael Wilson, a former Finance Minister in
the Brian Mulroney 1980s Progressive Conservative government, as Ambassador to
the United States.

But these steps were countered
by swift cancellation of the Liberal national childcare programme,
depriving the provinces of $5 Billion dollars, followed by Conservative Defence Minister Gordon O’Connor’s untimely
admission that his government is willing to consider joining Washington’s ballistic missile defence scheme.

The Liberal Party is not in
much better shape, under interim leader Bill Graham. Several former cabinet
ministers, and ex-ambassador Frank McKenna, have ruled out running for Leader,
leaving among the current front runners ex-Tory billionaire Belinda Stronach, and Harvard academic and pro-imperialist freshman
MP Michael Ignatieff.

One hopes that when folks see
how similar Tory economic policies are to recent Liberal ones, it will dash
more than a few illusions in both big business parties.

NDP,
Lift Suspension of Hargrove!

New Democratic Party federal
leader Jack Layton disagrees with the decision of the Ontario NDP to suspend
the membership of Canadian Auto Workers’ President Buzz Hargrove. The NDP
Socialist Caucus (SC) agrees with Jack Layton on this one.

In a February open letter the
SC argues, “Although we disagree strongly with so-called ‘strategic
voting’ and the actions of Hargrove during the most recent federal
election campaign, we oppose his suspension on general democratic grounds. The
priority for the party should be free and open debate on the conduct of the
latest NDP federal campaign. The suspension sends a chill into the body
politic, substituting a stern sanction for the frank and constructive
discussion needed now. Moreover, it is being done on a rather hypocritical
basis.”

As the Socialist Caucus argued
in a statement issued in December, Layton
is campaigning to win “more NDP seats,” not to form a government.
Though some claim this is a matter of “practicality,” it is really one
of principle. It implies that the prize is another Liberal minority government,
propped up by a somewhat larger NDP contingent. This is only a short step away
from CAW chief Buzz Hargrove’s explicit call for re-election of a
minority Liberal regime, backed by a few more New Democrats.

Will Hargrove’s
suspension make the NDP leadership more accountable for its own shortcomings? NDP
support for the anti-Québec Clarity Act, its over-adaptation to law and order
sentiments, and its silence on Ottawa’s
military intervention in Afghanistan
and Haiti
come to mind. Or will the disciplinary action simply divert attention from the
shift to the right, while tightening party ranks against dissent of any kind?

Hargrove says he will not
appeal the suspension, on the grounds that it was arbitrary and unfair to him. He
makes matters worse by now proposing an NDP-Liberal coalition to defeat the
Conservatives in the next election.

Nonetheless, party and labour activists should fight to lift the suspension to
avoid needlessly alienating CAW members from the NDP, and to foster an
unfettered and penetrating discussion of the strengths and weaknesses of the
recent NDP campaign.

Defend
Muslims, Palestine and Iran

While protests continue
worldwide, thousands in Toronto have rallied
repeatedly in February against the provocative anti-Muslim cartoons and
propaganda emanating from Denmark
and other imperialist capitals. An anti-imperialist radicalization among a
significant portion of the Islamic population in Toronto is evident and may change the face of
working-class politics here. This is sparking a range of discussions on the
left as the anti-war movement gears up for protest actions on March 18.

A small example was the Toronto
Socialist Action forum on February 24 where 25 people gathered to hear ZafarBangash, director of the Institute of Contemporary
Islamic Thought, Diana Ralph, representing the Campaign to
Stop Secret Trials in Canada,
and BahmanYedi, a veteran
Iranian solidarity activist and member of Socialist Action, address the topic “Free
Speech or Hate Speech? Defend Muslims, Iran
and Palestine
against Imperialist attack.”

Bangash
pointed to the recent bombing of a sacred mosque in Samarra, Iraq
as indicative of the divide and rule tactics employed by the US rulers to control the oil-rich region, even
if it means dismembering Iraq.

Ralph referred to what she
called “the production of Islamophobia”
and the labeling of opponents of the USempire as terrorists, as a direct a product of
political strategies devised by Washington,
including the Defense Policy Guidance of 1993, and the subsequent Project for a
New American Century.

Yedi
reminded the audience of the CIA-engineered overthrow of elected Iranian
President Mossadegh in 1953 after he nationalized
that country’s oil industry, and how the US
supplied and pressed Saddam Hussein’s Iraq
to wage war on Iran
following the 1979 popular revolution that ousted the US-backed Shah Mohammad Reza
Pahlavi.

Other speakers linked the
victory of Hamas in the recent Palestine Authority
election to rising anti-imperialist sentiment on a global scale. Beneath the
religious indignation provoked by reactionary media attacks is a deep desire by
millions of Muslims for social justice and radical change, including a
rejection of local rulers who submit to the dictates of Washington and its
powerful allies.

Socialist Voice supporter
Suzanne Weiss, who chaired the SA forum, urged everyone to counter the attack
on Muslims and on all who stand up against imperialism by working for the
broadest possible unity in anti-war action on March 18.

Force
Kingsley to Answer for Haiti
Role

René Préval,
a former ally of deposed President Aristide, handily won the election for Haiti president
on February 7. Despite facing dozens of opponents, some financed by big money
from the US, Préval enjoyed an initial 60 per cent
lead — that is, until dirty tricksters shifted into overdrive, absconding with
dozens of ballot boxes later found smouldering in a
garbage dump, and adding thousands of blank ballots that appeared to lower Préval’s majority.

In fact, of the 2.2 million
votes cast, 5 per cent were declared invalid, and 10 per cent were not counted
a week after the vote — when much of the country erupted into a massive
protest that ground the economy to a halt. That is when the national election
commission, no doubt nudged by the forces of military occupation operating
under the U.N. flag of convenience, “declared” Préval
to be elected. Was Préval forced into making a “deal”
involving concessions to foreign interests, or was the act of “declaration”
(done to conceal a failed attempt at stealing the election) sufficient for the
imperialists to sully Préval’s victory and
undermine his mandate to effect change in the poverty-stricken nation? Time
will tell, and it may be soon as Préval signals he
will welcome the return of Jean-Bertrand Aristide from his exile in South Africa.

But a nagging question
persists. How is it that Jean-Pierre Kingsley, Election Canada’s chief,
and the head of the International Mission for Monitoring Haitian Elections,
flatly rejected the likelihood of fraud in the days immediately following
February 7? Indeed, Kingsley said the Haitian election was one of best he has
ever seen. It makes one wonder how many elections Kingsley has seen where there
are no polling places in huge urban slums, where rural voters must walk several
kilometres to vote, and where thousands of marked and
unmarked ballots are found aflame in a dump. Quite apart from the gross
involvement of foreign money in partisan campaigns, and the hundreds of
millions devoted to the ongoing military occupation and training of police who
terrorize the poor population and murder civilians wantonly, what purpose was
served by the $30 million spent by the Canadian government to help run this
election?

Kingsley’s remarks smell
like a foul cover-up, in aid of the ongoing subjugation of Haiti by Canada,
France, Brazil and the US, and the wealthy sweat shop
owners who stand to continue to profit.

Responding to critical and
persistent pressure over his silence, during the recent federal election
campaign, concerning the crimes of Canadian imperialism in Haiti, New
Democratic Party leader Jack Layton seems to be taking a different tack by
issuing this demand: “The NDP calls on Prime Minister Stephen Harper to direct
his Minister of Foreign Affairs to carefully review Canada’s role in
Haiti since February 2004 and to report his findings to the Standing Committee
on Foreign Affairs.”

Although the call is remiss in
exempting the period prior to 2004 (e.g. the coup that overthrew Aristide was
planned at a government sponsored conference held in Ottawa in early 2003), it
is still a positive step to put this issue on the parliamentary agenda (since
standing committees report to the House of Commons) — provided that the
NDP vigorously presses it forward in the days ahead, rather than discards it as
a token gesture.

The Canada Haiti Action
Network, anti-imperialist and anti-war forces, and the labour
movement would be wise to press the NDP, and the new
Conservative government on this very point.

Stephen Harper’s
obnoxious call on René Préval to foster “national
reconciliation” in Haiti
is part of the cover up of electoral duplicity, and part of the imperialist
drive to cripple Préval’s capacity to effect
meaningful change, whether Préval intends to do so or
not. Harper (along with the former Paul Martin Liberal regime) should be
challenged on this file, and exposing Kingsley’s role in Haiti
could be the linchpin.

Tuition
Woes in Ontario

Fear and foreboding weigh heavily
on the minds of many Ontario
university students these days as they wonder how much tuition will rise. Will it be close to the 2 per cent reflected in the
familiar Consumer Price Index, or the 4.6 per cent claimed by universities in
their own inflation calculus weighted more towards their salary and energy
costs?

Speculation is that Ontario
Liberal Premier Dalton McGuinty will soon let institutions
hike fees for some programmes more than others —
law and medicine up 10 per cent, say, with arts and science up just 2 per cent —
as long as a school’s overall average fee hike comes in under the
expected target of 5 to 6 per cent.

Tuition at the law faculty of University of Toronto
is already the highest in Canada
at $16,000 a year, and heading towards $22,000. Undergraduate tuition has
jumped 139 per cent in regulated programmes since
1994, and Ontario grads owe the highest
average debt in Canada
— $22,700.

Canada
ranks 11th out of 16 developed
countries for affordability in higher education, according to the non-profit
Education Policy Institute based in Toronto and Washington, D.C.Sweden, France,
Ireland and Germany charge
no tuition at all.

In Canada,
tuition covers about 30 per cent of the cost of post-secondary education
outside Ontario.
But in Ontario,
fees cover 44.6 per cent.

So how is it that medical
school students at U of T pay $16,000 a year, while at McGillUniversity in Montreal, Québec the fee is only $3,500?

The answer is simple: political
action. Québec students, backed by the Québec labour
movement, have mobilized in massive general strikes every decade or so, and as
recently as March 2005, against provincial government threats to raise fees or
to reduce grants. Will the Canadian Federation of Students Ontario branch
follow suit, or will it just watch fee and debt numbers continue to zoom-zoom
northwards?

The
Case of the Incredibly Shrinking Pensions

Why do employers try to reduce
workers’ pensions?

To pad profits. To enhance “competitiveness.”To
take advantage of decades of labour retreat.In short, because they can.

Canadian federal regulators
report a marked increase in companies asking for approval to cut pension
benefits. Already, requests for reductions in the range of 10 per cent
affecting up to 8,000 plan members have been approved, said Nicholas Le Pan,
federal Superintendent of Financial Institutions, in a speech to the Empire
Club of Canada on February 16.

Le Pan estimates that
three-quarters of pension plans do not have enough assets to support all
benefits earned to date. He says this is largely due to low interest rates and
long life spans.

Maybe, in
part. So what’s the solution?

After twenty years of stagnant
wages, buoyant profits, and reduced corporate taxes, how about increasing
employer pension contributions?

That, however, is not what the
Office of the Superintendent of Financial Institutions has in mind. It suggests
cutting benefits and giving management more discretion over who gets to take
early retirement. In other words, delay retirement, undermine pensions (which
is a deferred wages fund for workers), in order to pay for bosses’ past
profit taking. And what about making pensions portable for all those workers
forced to change jobs during a lifetime of work? Forget it.

Meanwhile, readers will be
happy to learn that banks and insurance companies are in good financial health.
Insurers of homes, auto and commercial property report strong profits, close to
20 per cent return on equity.

It would be interesting to know
how their CEO pensions are doing.

Sedentary
Living Takes a Toll

Baby boomers may come to the
rescue of insolvent pension funds…by dying younger than their parents do.
Canadians born between 1945 and 1959 weigh more, and are less active than they
were a decade ago, says a report by the Heart and Stroke Foundation.

Thirty per cent of baby boomers
are obese, compared to 19 per cent a decade ago; 24 per cent of today’s
seniors are obese. Fifty-two per cent of boomers are physically inactive, up
from 43 per cent a decade ago; 50 per cent of today’s seniors report a
sedentary lifestyle. While smoking rates have decreased among boomers, 29 to 21
per cent in the last ten years, they are still higher than the 11 per cent of
seniors who smoke.

About 1.3
million Canadians 45 to 59 years old have already been diagnosed with
heart disease, stroke, or high blood pressure. Experts predict a major rise in
cardiac procedures, along with wait times for bypass surgery, angioplasty, and
pace maker implementations.

Does this suggest that a heavy
tax on fast food providers and big tobacco to promote healthy living and
chronic disease prevention would be in order?

A generation
of Ronald Macdonald addicts deserve a break today — because the
way things are going they won’t have much opportunity to worry about the
pensions they lack.